


No More Dreaming

by Tabithian



Series: Stitching up the Circuit Board [1]
Category: Batman (Comics), DCU, DCU - Comicverse, Nightwing (Comics), Red Robin (Comics)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Space, Canonical Character Death, Gen, Space Pirates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-24
Updated: 2012-10-24
Packaged: 2017-11-16 23:14:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,035
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/544899
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tabithian/pseuds/Tabithian
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tim's been running since he was fifteen, space freighters and transports.</p>
            </blockquote>





	No More Dreaming

**Author's Note:**

> Ahaha, so I was listening to [Florence + the Machine's "Blinding"](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Da6bBKLPEGg) on repeat last night. *hands*

Tim's been running since he was fifteen, space freighters and transports. He tries to stick to the colony worlds if he can. There's less chance of running into people who want what he has, or thinks he has. Tim never claimed ownership. He's never wanted to.

“Funny, yeah?” he asks, breathing hard, legs churning. 

They're so far out that the people chasing him are using actual projectile weapons because they're more reliable out here. Less likely to blow up in their hands and take out an installation. 

_Cut the chatter, and fucking run._ There's a growl to the words, Big Bad annoyed at him.

Tim smiles, and puts on more speed. The corridors all look the same, institutional gray, but Big Bad's looking out for him, showing him the way as emergency lighting panels come to life.

Tim's been running since he was fifteen, but he hasn't always been running away. There are things that need to be done, things Big Bad needs to be done, and Tim's the only one who can do it.

“Maybe you should have picked Hansel instead,” Tim says, sliding around a corner and ducking low when another spray of gunfire comes too close. 

_Yeah, and maybe you should shut the hell up and do what I tell you._

He wants to laugh, but doesn't have the air for that and then he hits the hangar, blast doors shutting behind him with finality. Takes his pursuers a while to get through them. Big Bad's got the compound locked down now and their only recourse to cut through the blast doors – or if they're feeling especially reckless – blow them open.

Once he's got his breathing under control Tim looks up at the sleek ship before him, built for speed, for stealth, the best minds of Wayne Enterprises behind her. The reason Tim's here, Big Bad an insufferably smug presence in the back of his mind.

_Your chariot._

“We're dead,” Tim says, but he stumbles forward, laying a hand against the ship's hull, smile pulling at his mouth. 

She's _beautiful_.

“What do you call a thief who steals from other thieves?” Tim asks, rounding the bow. 

Big Bad has the entry ramp lowered, and as Tim walks up it the ship's lights come up. Inside she's all stark, clean lines. Made for a purpose, a reason. 

“An idiot,” Big Bad answers, using the ship's internal speakers. “We have ten minutes tops before they get through those doors. You plan on sticking around for that?”

Not so much, no. “Let's get out of here,” Tim says, headed for the cockpit. 

********

Tim thought Big Bad was just an A.I. when he stumbled across him, buried in the Drake Industries mainframe like a dirty little secret. Hidden away like so many of the projects his parents made sure the public never found out about. 

He was wrong. So, so wrong.

In his defense, it wasn't immediately clear. Big Bad had behaved like a fledgling A.I. Learning how to interact, speak with others. With Tim. (Rediscovering, Tim found out later, when he'd done more digging, unearthing something more like a horror story than heartwarming tale of a boy and his A.I.)

And like any fledgling A.I. he'd had questions. So many questions and Tim, lonely with his parents away so often, had answered them. One after another after another. Whys and Hows and everything in between. He'd seen him as as little brother, indulged Big Bad by reading to him, even though he could have pulled them up himself, read them himself faster than Tim could. (I like when you read to me. I like your voice.)

Tim had had a red hoodie at the time, old, ragged. Much loved. 

Big Bad had latched onto that when Tim read “Little Red Riding Hood” to him. He'd started calling Tim Little Red, and Tim had taken to calling him Big Bad. (An apt name once Big Bad grew into himself, a frighteningly ruthless force to be reckoned with when it came to Tim's safety.)

Tim misses those days, sometimes. When things were simpler. When people weren't trying to kill him, take Big Bad back to destroy him before his existence could come to light. 

********

“Why are all of your plans terrible?”

Tim is currently wondering that himself. “Who doesn't love space pirates?” he asks, staring at the viewscreen and the ships arrayed before the _Revenant_.

Her big sisters, made for battle, like wolves circling their prey. 

“Terrible,” Big Bad says again, resigned because they've been together long enough that he knows Tim's an idiot.

“Well, yes,” Tim says. He ran away from home when he was fifteen with a hastily packed bag and an A.I. riding piggyback via his neural implants. Of course his plans are terrible. 

“When is a space pirate not a space pirate?”

“We're going to _die_.”

Tim laughs at that, eying the blinking light on the comm board. “Probably, yeah.” 

********

The thing about Big Bad is that he isn't an A.I. 

That is. 

Not a simple computer program at heart, no. He's a cheat, someone trying to take a shortcut, and then being surprised when that didn't work out the way they'd intended.

It's virtually impossible for anyone to go through life these days without a complete scan of their neural net existing, not with the prevalence of neural implants. A complete map of their brain, a starting point for someone who wants to create an A.I. capable of human thought and behavior, or coming remarkably close to it. 

Sometimes, though. Sometimes there are people who are desperate. People who lack things like ethics or morals. People who see nothing wrong in what they're doing. People who see the homeless as opportunities. Untapped resources.

Big Bad had acted like a fledgling A.I. when Tim found him because he was damaged. Not learning how to interact with the outside world, with Tim, but _relearning_. Organic and inorganic merging, repairing damaged sections, forging new links and pathways. 

Rebuilding. 

********

Tim holds still, hands in the air as the pirates board the _Revenant_. He can feel Big Bad's anger, resentment thrumming in the back of his mind, linked through his implants.

 _Down boy,_ he thinks, faintly amused at the snarl he gets back for that. _This is what we've been working for, remember?_

“Nice ship,” the pirate commander says, stopping in front of Tim, amused. “Mind telling me where you got it?”

Tim raises an eyebrow at that. “I found her.” 

“You found her,” the pirate commander says again, clearly dubious. “You must have heard about the Wayne Enterprises prototype that went missing.”

 _Oh, I remember this._ Big Bad says. _Asshole._

Tim bites back a smile. “It was all over the news feeds for a while. Of course I heard about it.”

That gets him a sharp look. “You wouldn’t have had something to do with it, would you?”

“Why are you wasting time talking with a common thief,” one of the pirates sneers, hand resting on the hilt of the sword at his hip. “Take the ship and be done with it.” He bares his teeth at Tim. “Space him.”

 _No,_ Tim thinks firmly when he feels Big Bad surge forward, angry, protective. 

The lights flicker, all eyes going to Tim.

_Dammit, Red, the little bastard -_

_No._

“Care to explain what that was?” the pirate commander asks, and really. What better line?

 _Now_.

There's a beat, Big Bad hesitating, and then, “Long time no see, Dickiebird.”

********

The thing about Tim running? There was purpose behind it. Initially to protect Big Bad, _Jason_ , when he couldn't do that for himself, and once his core memories, his essence, had reasserted themselves - 

“Someone did this to him,” Tim says, aware of the bloodthirsty figure scowling at him from the corner of the room. “They - “

“They turned me into this,” Jason says, quiet challenge. Tim can feel his fury building, familiar. 

Dick looks at Tim.

“I – we – have files. Evidence, proof.” Five years of running, learning, planning an attack. Tim sighs, looks away. “He wasn't the only one.”

Not the only one, no. Just the first successful one. Slated to be scrapped because the organic material that was 'volunteered' proved to be...damaged by the manner of Jason's death. 

(And yes, Tim _knows_. He'd known about Bruce Wayne and his private fleet of 'space pirates' and the fact that Jason had been part of it before Jason had been killed. He'd known before Jason had been turned into what he is now.)

“There are others?” Dick asks, looking sick at the thought.

“No,” Tim says. “They didn't survive the initial process.”

Dick sits back, fingers resting on the data pad Tim had given him. Looks at Jason's avatar scowling back from a computer screen. “Why didn't you come to us before now?” he asks.

Tim _looks_ at him. “I didn't know it was Jason at first,” Tim says with a small shrug. “Then.” he laughs, helpless. “The people who did this? They're very persistent.” 

“We could have - “

“Fuck off, Dick. You weren't there,” Jason growls, like the fairytale character whose name he'd chosen for himself before Tim discovered his real identity. “You don't get to second guess.”

“Jay - “

“ _No_.”

“What now?” Tim interrupts. “You have the files we gathered, the proof. You can take them down, make sure they don't do this to anyone else.” 

His parents may have funded the project, but they're not the ones who have been so invested in destroying Jason, making sure no one knows he exists. They're not blameless, innocent, in this, but. 

Dick cocks his head to the side. “What do you expect?”

Tim doesn't know, is the thing. He's been focused so long in making sure Jason got the justice he deserved, and hadn't really thought past that. Hadn't expected to make it this far.

He feels the equivalent of a head slap from Jason, _Idiot_.

“I don't know,” Tim says. “A lift home, maybe?” 

The _Revenant_ had been an added bonus, and a little bit of selfishness on Tim's part. Wanting to take one of the ships Bruce used for his fleet for a spin before ending things. He never expected to keep her. Or Jason.

Dick considers that for a moment, eyes going to the data pad, to Jason's avatar, before landing back on Tim. “You seem to have done okay for yourselves.” 

“We get by,” Tim says. More or less. He definitely doesn't like the look on Dick's face. So like Jason's when he's up to something. 

“About that,” Dick says, indicating the data pad. “What do you say about joining us?” He grins. “I'd have to clear it with Bruce, but I think you – both of you – would be tremendous assets.”

Tim can feel Jason's surprise, his wariness. “Just like that.”

“You brought Jason back to us, Tim. And from what you said, it wasn't easy.” Dick shrugs, shooting a look at the troll in the corner, mouth pulling up into a smile. “Our little family isn't exactly traditional. Never has been.”

It's tempting but - 

“On one condition,” Jason says, startling Tim. 

Dick grins, slow and lazy, like he knows he has them. “Shoot.”

“We get to keep the _Revenant_ ,” Jason says, not a surprise because he loves her. All speed and promise, dangerous. Beautiful.

The troll growls, but keeps quiet at another look from Dick. “Done. Anything else?”

_Little Red?_

There's. It's not longing, coming from Jason, but. They've been running for so long, and this. It feels... _safe_.

“No,” Tim says, speaking for them both. “We're good.”

********

Tim settles back into the _Revenant_ 's pilot's seat, watching space blur past. The rest of Bruce’s' fleet is in formation around them, Dick in command on the flagship _Nightwing_ on their way to Earth.

“When is a space pirate not a space pirate?” Tim asks, because Jason never gave him an answer.

There's a sense of vicious satisfaction from Jason in back of his mind, oh what big teeth he has.

"When he's a wolf."

Tim's been running since he was fifteen, but he hasn't always been running _away_ , and now Little Red and Big Bad are finally coming home.


End file.
